The adventure log is where you list the sessions and adventures your party has been on, but for now, we suggest doing a very light “story so far” post. Just give a brief overview of what the party has done up to this point. After each future session, create a new post detailing that night’s adventures.

One final tip: Don’t stress about making your Obsidian Portal campaign look perfect. Instead, just make it work for you and your group. If everyone is having fun, then you’re using Obsidian Portal exactly as it was designed, even if your adventure log isn’t always up to date or your characters don’t all have portrait pictures.

After the man with the smirk had freed a hand, apparently removing some skin in the process, there was the sound of approaching footsteps, and a jingling of keys. Opening the cell door, the guards came in, led by an individual whom, given his greasy and unkempt appearance, must have been the jailer.

Releasing you from your shackles, you were led by spear point (and occasional spear butt) through some long, twisty tunnels, that got more and more dwarven in appearance the further you went from the cells.

You eventually appeared in much warmer room than the dungeon, a fairly large room with banners every few yards down both sides, and a throne at the far end. Once you got closer to the throne, you made out the two figures, a dwarf sitting on the throne, and a man in plate armour, showing some signs of abuse, and with a huge bruise on one side of his face.

The guards made you line up in front of the pair, and made you wait upon the king, Kal Meeron.

He gave you a once over then looked at the man standing beside him. “So Captain, this motley bunch managed to beat you and your armsmen in a tavern brawl? So much for the vaunted proficiency of the Inquisition”

The captain, scowls at you and the dwarf king in turn, before trying to have a large (and height reducing procedure) performed on you. Kal Meeron, promptly “bopped” him on the head, told him to go away, then proceeded to banish you from Drask

You were then taken through some more tunnels, though given the level of dust and dirt, the promise of “being sent out onto the trade road” seemed less and less likely. After you recovered all your equipment (with some sideways looks at Og and his axe from the mainly human guards), you were led to a set of enormous, dust covered stone doors, fantastically carved, and incredibly heavy, as it needed assistance from Raaxis to open.

After Jaunet lit a torch, the large stone door was sealed shut behind you, and you were left in darkness (mostly). Travelling down the wide dwarven made passage for around an hour, as the torch guttered out and another was lit, Jaunet spotted something glinting to one side. It appeared to be a small, dwarven made book stand, with a single letter sitting upon it. After it had been looked at thoroughly by Elthuin, the letter was picked up and read. In the local trade tongue, it requested that the adventurers, upon leaving the tunnels, went to the town of Penthflower, and in exchange for five silvers a day, plus basic room and board, the group was to assist the Innkeeper of the Sunset, in anyway possible to ensure that the Inquisition didn’t gain too much of a foothold in the town.

Upon further examination of the paper the note was written on, Chiana found that the note had been there for a good long while, at least several years, as the paper was brittle, despite being of high quality.

Thinking that they could sort something out when they got out onto the plains, the note was pocketed and the march to the outside proceeded.

For around forty minutes.

At this point the dwarven tunnel had suffered a major collapse, with the entire width of the enormous tunnel blocked with rubble. Despairing for only a second or two, a small, four foot high cave was spotted off the to left of the rockfall, which after exploration by Elthuin, led into a further, larger cave inhabited by pygmy dragonborn (as it was put so eloquently by Elthuin).

Travelling through the cave into the cavern, the group managed to get nearly everyone though unseen, until the heavily armoured Raaxis and Gurukaas managed to alert the creatures within to their presence.

After a brief battle, in which Og took several mighty blows, and repaid in kind (and following a burst of life energy from Gurukaas to close up some of the wounds), they proceeded through some more caves, discovering some long abandoned crates from a dwarven merchant house containing some usable coinage, they encountered the leader of the kobold (as indeed, that’s what the pygmy dragonborn were), a winged kobold that promptly threw bolts of searing fire at the scouting Elthuin.

A fierce battle followed, with several of the party being put to sleep, before the strange kobold and her guards were “put down”.

Clearing the rest of the tunnels, the party found where the kobolds had entered the caves, from a vertical chimney that led deeper underground, into the Underdark, that the kobolds had re-purposed into a privy.

Luckily, they found the passage that led back into the dwarven tunnels, and several hours later, they exited onto the side of a mountain, overlooking the land of Hendra.

Proceeding down towards the just visible lights of a town at night, the party ventured past a large wood (or a small forest), were Og, moving ahead of the group, startled some deer, and with a mighty javelin throw, took one down. After butchering the beast, a process that made Chiana slightly queasy, the group continued into Penthflower, were at the Sunset Inn, they managed to negotiate beds and board with the new Innkeeper Content Not Found: bolan, using the decade old note from Kal Meeron.

The next morning, after some honey sweetened porridge, the party was given knowledge about the town, including the status of the often pilfered from Inquisition barracks going up across from the Inn. As the Inquisition had been pulled mostly off to the coast to “command” the Hendran military to fend of an upsurge of Elven raiders, he didn’t appear too bothered about “hindering them” though if they could figure out what happened to the trees (apparently, a couple of times a year, several get up and walk away) or the dwarven outpost that hadn’t been heard from in several years they could fulfil their “debt” to Drask and it’s Kal. Alternatively, which the party decided to do, an old dwarven shrine up on the mountain road to Drask had been taken over by goblins, and they were attacking the caravans that traded up that way.

Getting to the shrine was easy, and in amongst the goblin graffiti over the images of Moradin, they found a hidden door deeper into the shrine, which they decided to take, after hearing some strange shuffling noises from behind the main door.

The tunnel, after springing a trap onto the unaware Gurukaas, from which the group found a nice dwarven made spear, they found the priest chamber. After a quick search, they found several nice things, and Jaunet left an apologetic kobold knife after the rest of the party had left.

They quickly found the source of the shuffling, four zombies occupying a rough hewn chamber that lay just after the priests calling room. During the fight, several goblins tried make a run through the chaos, but a fast sleep spell from Chiana and some knife work later, they (and the smashing and slicing resistant zombies) lay dead.

At this point the party had a short rest, to gather their breath, before they proceed deeper into the shrine…

So, you successfully cleared the Shrine to the Old Gods, defeating the evil necromancer that was causing all those issues.

You then, after a brief period in town, headed to the old Dwarven Outpost of Krazack, just over a day’s march from Penthflower.

You proceeded down the ravine, into the cave entrance where you managed to find a pit trap. Bypassing that, you explored the old keep, finding several kobolds, one of which you managed to talk to.

He was fairly useless, and kept jabbering on about his poor white lizard, that the local goblins had released when they raided the kobold settlement.

After killing some more kobolds, you had a brief rest, then continued to explore the old ruins. You located several interesting shrines, one that gave you a potion of fire breath, another that released a cloud of poison gas, that wounded Elthuin and Raaxis.

Almost immediately after the gas attack, you found the largest rat you had ever seen, that tried to eat you all. After a somewhat longer fight than you thought, the huge rat and it’s companion big rats were dealt with you continued through the area.

After fighting off some goblins, that set up a small ambush using caltrops, you found the goblin trophy room, which had off all things, mounted rats and cow heads. The unusual thing about the room was the destruction, and the large iron spike with a chain attached that had been left in the room. When Chiana cast a faerie fire, it illuminated the “lizard”, pure white and about 4 ft long. Og and Raaxis entered the room to deal with the beast, and after they had thumped it a couple of times, the lizard moved back and unleashed a mighty blast of cold air, freezing the pair, and alerting the rest of the group that this wasn’t a lizard.

After the fight had finished, and the gnome that they had previously rescued, Esky Timbers provided some healing, and the party discovered that the “lizard” that in fact was a extremely young white dragon, that the kobolds had somehow captured and removed it’s wings.

Clearing the area, the party encountered the last occupants of the level, a group of hobgoblins and goblins. The opening few blows favoured the party, with Jaunet clearing most of the larger, tougher hobgoblins with a burning hands, when from an adjoining room, the goblin ruler and his shaman, along with several more goblins came into the fight, severely wounding Raaxis, and putting the raging Og into strife as well.

The tide of battle turned in the party’s favour, when Elthuin, using the potion from the fountain, killed a huge number of the foe, and the tough hobgoblin that was leading the enemy fell.

The last goblin tried to surrender, however Jaunet and Chiana would have none of it, and they finished it off with spell and bow.

Feeling exhausted, the party holed up and rested, learning some new skills in the process, before investigating the cool dragon door they found earlier in the keep. Passing through it, and clearing a pair of traps, one a musical orb that did it’s best to convince the party to “run away”, there was a brief scuffle when a Quasit, a denzien of the lower planes attacked and poisoned Elthuin. The fiend, surviving the first blow at it, got blown away by a spell from Chiana, and the party continued, leaping over a pit that hindered their path into a old, tomb.

Inside the tomb was a odd looking sarcophagus, featuring sweeping dragonwings as it’s lid. With the rest of the group hanging back, Og and Raaxis opened the tomb, and were extremely surprised when it exploded, showering them and heavily wounding them with jagged pieces of stone, revealing a massive troll, that after being mightily hit by Elthuin returned the favour, knocking him down and out, before falling to Raaxis. Chaina, ensured the beast was dead, before checking the room for anything of value, finding some gold and magical scrolls.

The party is now having a short break, before using the vine covered wall in the goblin leaders’ room to descend deeper into the old keep

So, after a short break, with the health of the party ably helped by Chiana, you proceeded to explore the last area of the dwarven keep.

The only passage to the lower level was via a huge, long climb down a vine encrusted wall. Elthuin tied a rope to himself and started the climb, making a minor slip that caused him to fall 20ft, then again which neatly ended him 2 inches from the floor, with the rest of the party holding him up.

Deciding that the vines were a bad idea, the party knotted the rope and climbed down, at the bottom encountering a pair of gardeners. Though they looked a bit thin and bony, they ignore the group until they approached the small area they were working, at which point the skeletons attacked. The most shocking thing was that the trees the skeletal gardeners were tending also began to attack!

Quickly turning the skeletons and the trees to splinters (both bone and wood), the party explored the rest of the area, encountering a hugely ornate gallery, with everything bar the artworks in place. Elthuin spotted a bed setup in one of the small rooms, and they followed the tracks through the dust, destroying a skeletal sweeper on their way outside.

Well, not outside, but into a huge chamber magically light up like a beautiful summer’s day. Near a massive, thorny, dark wood tree, the team spotted Esky’s former companions, Sir Braford and Sharwyn, along with a third figure wearing a cassock.

After using a spell to detect the minds of the nearby figures, Chiana discovered two things, one is that both Sir Braford and Sharwyn didn’t appear to be thinking, and that there were six fairly primitive minds about 10ft below the surface.

After hearing that his friends were ok, Esky ran forward to greet them, at which point Sharwyn let loose a magic missile spell that knock Esky down. The fight was on. Sir Braford came out to meet the party, the holy symbol on his shield all but obliterated as he let out a hideous roar, causing Elthuin, Chiana and Gurukaas to panic and flee, whilst Og, Raaxis and Jaunet held back the extremely difficult to effectively wound Sharwyn, and the simply hard to hit SIr Braford.

After a long, difficult fight, in which Og proved how tough a half-orc barbarian from the steppes can be, and Sir Braford showing how much a nuisance a fallen paladin can be, the party was victorious, even capturing the man in robes, who revealed his name to be Belak.

After some pointed questions, and learning the name of the tree that Jaunet had just completely burned to the ground, Gulthias, Belak turned himself into a weasel and tried to flee, however several arrows and thrown weapons made short work of him.

Gathering their things, and those of their fallen adversaries, including shatterspike, Sir Braford’s sword, the party had a brief rest, then ventured out back to Penthflower.

When they got near the village, the more eagle eyed of the group spotted a plume of smoke from the village, and when they got nearer, they passed the burnt out remains of the smithy, and found, near the village square, a patrol of the Inquisition, preparing to burn out old Gladys, for the crime of witchcraft.

Not liking this, or the hulking Captain that was leading the cookout, several of the party attacked, and got a bit of a shock when the patrol members acted quickly, throwing lit torches into the house, and turning to fire at them, with the greater shock coming from the unusual skill of the captain, using not just his greatsword proficiently, but also using several spells to protect himself and hinder the party.

However, once the Captain fell, the fight was effectively won, with a brief panic when Gurukaas and Raaxis fell in the attempt to rescue poor Gladys, but they were dragged clear by Chiana.

Disposing of the patrols bodies in the blazing building, and lamenting the loss of the captains valuable armor (melted by the over enthusiastic Chiana’s spell), the party fell back to the Inn, where Balun told them what had happened to all the young people of the village. All of the young from 2 years to around 20 were taken into wagons and left east the day before (after the destruction of the smithy). Using his familiar, Jaunet tracked them to a campsite 30 miles away from town, but his familiar came back with a crossbow bolt addition.

The party, (along with Gladys) are holed up in Balun’s basement, having a night’s rest before journeying onwards…

After a peaceful, undisturbed rest in the Inn’s basement, you awoke to find that both Esky Timbers and Gladys Firewine had disappeared during the night, with Gladys leaving you a present of money and a note scribed in Elvish.

I thank you for your aid, please accept this token of thanks. I’m sure we’ll meet again

Leaving the basement, you quickly questioned some of the village folk, and after questioning Uncle Mede in his shop, he let you know that he hadn’t seen his son, as he sent him on the road west earlier to pick some things up for him. Chiana spotted that the shop had all it’s metal items missing, spade heads, rake heads, scythe blades, all gone. When they questioned Uncle about it, he said that the Inquisition had taken them all, at the same time they burnt down the blacksmith.

Concerned for the blacksmith, they quickly searched the remains of the smithy, fortunately not finding any bones in the wreckage.

Deciding that they had lost enough time, they headed out of town at a extremely brisk pace, trying to catch the fleeing wagons of the Inquisition on foot.

That evening, a tired party entered the town of Etherwine, though Chiana was exhausted, they got rooms at the Inn (cheap) and had some food and beer (expensive). Chiana had a look round the local Church of the Unchained God, and found an old priest, Father Eldin, who gave her some info on their religious practices, which seemed occasionally at odds with the behaviour of the Inquisition – a fact the priest seemed really uncomfortable with.

Later that night, Ethan and Chiana went and explored the Inquisition barracks on the outskirts of town, and saw a large number of guards on the wall. When Ethan struggled to climb the palisade to look in, Chiana had a go and saw the last of a group of the captured children being led into the building. The puzzling thing is that she spotted only one wagon, whereas Jaunet (care of his owl familiar) knew that there was at least three that left Penthflower.

Coming back to let the rest of the party know what they had found, they all returned to the barracks, and using a combination of stealth and blades, Og and Ethan climbed the wall and dispatched the two pairs of patrolling guards, though their was a brief instance of panic, when they tossed some of the bodies over the wall, the guards quivers emptied, nearly hitting Chiana, who was at the base of the palisade to provide some magical support for the infiltration effort.

After opening the palisade gate and entering the main building, they found a kind of internal stables that contained six unusually proportioned horses. The rest of the building was taken up by two short archery ranges and two circles, that Raaxis identified as sword training areas.

Around the edge of the building, about 25ft up, there was a narrow wooden walkway that allowed access to the barracks arrow slits. Deciding it would be a great vantage point to attack anything that appeared, Chiana climbed up a nearby ladder, but when she tried to pull it up, she dropped it, making a huge clattering sound.

A few seconds later, the rooms everburning torches got covered by hoods, plunging the room into darkness, allowing a pair of shadowy warriors to attack the party, severely wounding Gurukaas. The team managed to dispatch the assassins, but were then faced with a new problem. The door to the lower level was locked tight, and it was a huge steel door, designed to withstand (according to Raaxis) siege weaponry. Of further concern was the barely audible “boom boom boom” of slow drumbeats from behind the door.

Using Raaxis’ block and tackle and the strange horses. they managed to get the door harnessed up to the horses, and with a command from Og, the they managed to free the door. Unfortunately, the horses didn’t seem to be able to stop, and they went bolting off into the darkness, dragging the remains of the door (and Raaxis’ block and tackle) behind them.

Descending into the next level, they encountered a weapons room and a barracks on one side, the barracks containing two Inquisition guards and one of the Inquisition Captains. Killing them proved easy once more (thanks to Chiana’s heat metal), they then checked the next room.

It was pitch black, and even the parties lights didn’t penetrate too far into it. Upon entering, the leading members of the group were attacked by living shadows, draining the strength of Og and Ethan. Deciding that fighting shadows was a fools game, the party explored the other side of the entry room, finding a guardpost (empty, bar a few coins) and a prison area, were several of the missing children were found, including Uncle Mede’s son, Inbral.

A quick look over them revealed that they had been drugged by something to make them docile, as they didn’t respond to any of the groups questions or actions.

After confirming that the four people in the cage were drugged and unable to be roused from their stupor, the party proceeded through the Inquisition’s barracks. You entered a chamber filled with a haze, and the ever present drumming was loudest in this room, though you could now make out the source, a massive framed drum at the rear of the room, beside a altar.

On the altar was one of the villagers from Penthflower, and standing over him with a knife was an Priest of the Inquisition, uttering words in an unknown tongue. Springing into action, you managed to quickly knock out the converted villagers that rushed to attack you. You also began to deal rapidly with the Inquisition soldiers, however the strange miasma in the air was having some odd effects, whenever you got wounded, you were overcome by an uncontrollable rage, and in Og’s case, it was severe enough to knock Gurukaas unconscious.

In fact, it was neither Gurukaas (brought round by a quick potion fix by Elthuin) nor Raaxis’s night, as they each fell again to the footman and the priest, who proved a huge nuisance by banishing Og out of the fight.

You eventually won, and tied up the crazed villagers and released Justin, the blacksmith of Penthflowers apprentice. He informed you that the smith himself was killed by the Inquisition when they burned down the smithy.

You retired then out from the barracks, after stopping to loot the treasury, and concealed yourselves just outside of town whilst Chiana went and fetched the old priest, Father Eldin, who managed to clear the insanity that infected the two ox drivers that came from Penthflower.

After he had left, and you had donated a few hundred coins to his Church, you travelled slowly back to Penthflower, through the pouring rain, carting the crazed villagers, who came round as you entered the village.

13 First Summer 150 AU

Upon your return to town, the ruler of Drask, Kal Meeron was in Penthflower, supervising the pulling down of the half completed Inquisition barracks.

Greeting you, he enquired after your travels, and you gave him a report of your actions over the last two weeks in clearing the old Dwarven Shrine, the discovery of Belak, the crazy druid who was making the trees come to life, and the rediscovery of the old dwarven outpost, which Kal Meeron identified as Nubenzagar, an ancient dwarven hold that was abandoned some centuries past.

You also let him know about the Inquisition taking the young of Penthflower and the ritual that you had interrupted in Etherwine. Concerned, he told you to continue your investigations, and he also put you in charge of improving the village for him, and he left you some funds and materials to do so.

14 First Summer 150 AU through 24 First Summer 150 AU

During these two five-days, you helped to add improvements to the town, increasing it’s income by establishing a pair of trade routes, one into Drask and one down to Etherwine, and starting rebuilding the blacksmith and beginning the work on a wooden palisade to protect the town.

You also trained several of the townsmen as militia, hopefully they can stand off any small banditry and monsters that bother the town while you’re away.

Several of you also investigated the possibility of houses in the town, though with the craftsmen available, only Jaunet was satisfied by the basic way that they would be done.

25 First Summer 150 AU

It’s dawn at the end of the first month of summer, and you are preparing to hit the road once more…

As you were preparing to leave town, a small boy approached you and told you he found a hatch under the ruins of Gladys’ house. This was odd, as no-one who was in town after the Inquisition kidnappings remembered either her or Esky.

Exploring the hatch, it revealed a tunnel system that lead to a strange portal. After fighting off several animated armors and you entered the portal to end up in a forest, somewhere.

There, you wandered aimlessly, somehow never more than 40 or 50 feet from the entrance “stone”. During your wandering, you encountered a white stag, a dryad and a gorgon, all but the last ending peacefully.

Returning to the entry stone, you managed, via a sweet enticing song from Chiana, to coax out the rulers of the strange wood, who offered to you a challenge – take this chess piece and solve the puzzle it leads you to.

After figuring out the built in guidance system for the piece, you located the entrance to a cave complex, in which you found more of the chess pieces, however you did have to deal with some strange creatures, including a genie-like medusa, a destitute ogre mage and a water elemental.

Most worrying is that the most dangerous occupant of the (as it turned out prison) complex managed to flee before you killed it, leaving your “sponsors” perturbed. They did return you to Penthflower, however, all but Gurukass forgot the whole encounter, and when you searched, the hatch under the house had vanished.

After destroying a hidden Inquisition training camp for assassins, you proceeded towards Ba’aran, a middle sized city a week or so to the south of Penthflower.

There, you had some issues with the local Inquisition, when Gurukaas was arrested for being a heretic.

Fortunately, you managed to escape the town, even with the Inquisition teleporting in reinforcements.

Later on as you regrouped just north of Ba’aran, you made out a screeching sound that directed your gazes back toward the walled city.

Launching themselves from one of the taller towers, two shapes rapidly flew towards you, and after a few moments, they revealed themselves to be armored wyvern cavalry.

After fighting them off, you retrieved an odd pentagonal amulet from one of the “knights” and determining that they weren’t part of the normal Inquisition forces, you headed out away from the town before circling back towards “that fishing village”

On the way, you encountered a herd of wild cattle, that after a taming (then butchering attempt) that stampeded Og into the dirt. Og is still looking for his Eggs Benedict.

23 Second Summer 150 AU

A few days later, you arrived at the “fishing village”. After bluffing your way into the town, and having a brief look at the fishing vessels, a mighty bell rang out, and the strangely efficient militia fishermen rushed to the harbour man the ships, one of the mercenary captains grabbed Raaxis and sent the party to the tower.

There in the entry chamber, after setting off a glyph trap, they were ambushed by several mercenary warriors, and during the scuffle, Gurukaas fell to their blades.

The party is now recovering after the fight, and the strange effects of whatever curse is affecting Elthuin…

After mourning Gurukaas and freeing a captured drow monk, you proceeded through the tower, destroying a couple of vampire spawn, before facing Car’Leon in a chamber at the very peak of the tower.

There, you discovered that he had set you up, as he was the young man who told you where the assassin’s camp was. After Elthuin, falling to the strange malady that had been dogging him, fire his crossbow, leading into a huge battle with the Inquisition elite, with even the room attacking.

Eventually, he left the fight, and you fell back through the tower, and explored some more of the town, despite being heavily wounded. There you encountered a raiding band of elves, who had slipped past the Inquisition fleet.

Surviving the fight, you fled the town back to where your horses were, only to find them stolen by the dragonborn mercenaries that were guarding the town.

After an epic chase across the rolling, rocky lowlands of southern Hendra, you caught up with the fleeing mercs, and even though you lost a few horses, you managed to reclaim most of them.

After the fight you headed north, hoping to find an answer to Elthuin’s progressing demonism. In Penthflower, the town you are nominally running, you discovered in the time you had been away it had grown considerably, with the trade from Drask and beyond.

After informing the Innkeeper, Bolan of the elf invasion, you headed west with a caravan back to Drask.

There, after delivering Gurukaas’ holy symbol to a local church of Farad, you managed to track down the high priest of Dragazk, the Alemaster Drugan. There, in exchange for recovering some dwarven tomes lost in a old, abandoned shrine much deeper underground, he agreed to lift the curse on Elthuin.

It’s now 6 First Autumn 150 AU, and with the elves and the Inquisition ramping up their individual forces, can our heroes afford this delay?

Curse lifted, a new direction

Managing a quick trip to Drask, the party were directed by the Alemaster of Drask (it’s high priest) to retrieve some tomes of ancient dwarven rites, in exchange for lifting the curse on poor Elthuin.

Finding the abandoned shrine in the Underdark, Elthuin’s quest for a cure nearly ended when he ended up in a one on one fight against a mind flayer.

Luckily it didn’t, and the party retrieved the needed books. Returning to the Alemaster, he performed the ritual needed to lift the curse, though it involved a tough fight against several demons, Elthuin was freed.

After the curse was lifted, the party had a chat with the leader of Drask, Kal Meeron who directed the party to “do whatever they wish, as long as it increases trade between Ralston and Hendra.”

The news that the plainsmen barbarians of Ralston are increasing their raids on trade caravans added to the party’s woes, they decided that the Inquisition presence in the nearby mountains was the most pressing matter, and they headed that way.

The party has just defeated a heavily guarded caravan leaving a unusual looking building deep in the Sunrise Mountains, though with no idea as to what the Inquisition was leaving with.

Now, as autumn starts to lose it’s grip and winter begins, what will the party discover?